So quickly did the black horse swerve that the calico could not synchronize. For a moment Harford’s body and the taut stirrup were a strained connecting link. Then Polkadot edged nearer and Pape was able to lift the unconscious figure to a position of partial support across his mount’s forequarters.
But the stirrup still held, its iron shoe having been forced into the leather of Harford’s boot and fastened as in a vise. They might be coupled together until the black ran down unless——
The stretch of strap gave Pape an idea. Quick almost as the thought he drew his gun; took three shots; severed the link. Turning, he rode the doubly burdened piebald back in the direction of the two girls, while the thoroughbred sought exclusiveness in the far reaches of the glen. Probably because of the frequent back-fire of motors and the blow-out of tires which at times make Central Park suggest a West Virginia mining town on fusillade day, the curiosity of no sparrow cop had been excited by the gun reports.
Much more gently than he had gathered up his enemy, Pape now lowered him to the turf and flung out of saddle to a kneeling position. A cursory examination showed Harford’s fine-featured face to be somewhat marred by fist blows. But his body, so far as the emergency first aid could determine, was intact. The last fear of a possible skull fracture was dissipated when the brown eyes quivered open and the flaccid lips began to move.
“He’s trying to speak, Why Not,” exclaimed Irene, a moment ahead of Jane in dismounting. “Listen, do! In the novels I’ve read they always say the most important things when they’re coming out of—of a hiatus or whatever you call it.”
Pape leaned close enough to grasp part of the effortful mumble.
“Didn’t steal—anything. Sorry called you—names. Irene loves——”
That was as far as Harford got at the moment. And it was well, as the perquisitory miss demanded the context of his utterances.
Now, the telling of lies was abhorrent to Peter Pape. Seldom did he consider recourse to the slightest misrepresentation even when straight-out talk made complexities. But he found himself tempted by an inspiration as to how he might repay both enemy man and enemy girl for the trouble they had caused him with the same slight elaboration of the truth.
“It is your name on his lips,” he informed the romantic miss. “‘Irene’—you were his first thought. You’re the one he wants, my child, the one he calls for.”